


Stars Die (But We Don't)

by Greenninjagal



Series: Space and Everything In It [2]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternative Universe - Aliens, Deceit | Janus Sanders Needs a Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Human!Virgil, Humans are space orcs, I have never written something with such a sappy ending before in my life, M/M, Mentions of poor parenting, Ride or Die alien friends, Seventeen pages of Virgil finding increasingly complicated similies for how much he loves Janus, Survivors Guilt, Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders, Virgil is So fucking Gay for Janus, Virgil is all too happy to give him one, human!Janus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:41:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24667027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Greenninjagal/pseuds/Greenninjagal
Summary: “Sorry, Sorry,” Virgil muttered, “This is the last one.”“That shit burns,” Janus whined because he was still the untouchable golden boy who had never even skinned his knees before he met Virgil.“Sorry,” Virgil said because he was still the stupid kid who hated seeing others in pain.Janus pulled back slightly, just an inch or two out of Virgil’s reach. His eyes danced with a mischievous light, as he fluttered his eyelashes ever so innocently. “Kiss it better for me, Vee?”***Janus and Virgil talk about Scars, Death, and Names. Space is still a really big place.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Deceit | Janus Sanders
Series: Space and Everything In It [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1768714
Comments: 33
Kudos: 401
Collections: Humans Are Space Orcs





	Stars Die (But We Don't)

“What am I supposed to say?” Janus said indignantly. Virgil hadn’t thought it was possible to miss the sound of something so annoying, but here he was, somehow _grateful_ to hear the way that Janus’s tone conveyed absolutely no remorse for his actions. Condescending, patronizing, and snooty.

Apparently, very little about him had changed at all in the three years he had been declared dead, funneled through space, and ended up a very loyal member of Remus Prince’s Sucky Space Crew Extravaganza. The warmth in Virgil’s chest seemed spread, until he couldn’t quite place if it was an emotion or just part of being close to Janus again, like the way that Roman’s tail wagged the more Erefrens he was around.

“You could start with _“Hey Patton, sorry for almost shoving a knife in your eye”_.” Virgil suggested as he pressed the alien aloe to the cuts on Janus’s face as lightly as he could. Janus still hissed out a curse-- one of the many he seemed to know. Virgil thought that maybe that was his specialty because he had lost count of the scraps of languages that Janus had spouted.

“Sorry, Sorry,” Virgil muttered, “This is the last one.”

“That shit _burns_ ,” Janus whined because he was still the untouchable golden boy who had never even skinned his knees before he met Virgil.

“Sorry,” Virgil said because he was still the stupid kid who hated seeing others in pain. 

Janus pulled back slightly, just an inch or two out of Virgil’s reach. His eyes danced with a mischievous light, as he fluttered his eyelashes ever so innocently. “Kiss it better for me, Vee?”

“Kissing?” Virgil repeated, pretending like he wasn’t already leaning forward just a bit, like he hadn’t been eyeing the soft pick of Janus’s lips through their entire previous discussion, like the fact that Janus’s shirt was not his own through this whole thing was entirely coincidence and not by both their designs. “I don’t know, Jan…. on my Christian Minecraft server?”

Janus laughed, and Virgil was almost certain that sound alone added seventeen years to his lifespan. It felt a bit like serotonin being directly injected into his bloodstream, making him absolutely stupid happy. Or perhaps that was just part of being near him, like the warmth in his chest. Maybe somewhere in the three years they had been apart Janus had developed a superpower, like an off brand power ranger who had a really pretty smile.

“Oh, chastity,” Janus said, “Thou art my biggest foe!”

Virgil rolled his eyes, scooped a glob of the aloe on two fingers, and swiped up to catch the bottom of his chin. Janus tossed his head back hissing.

“Betrayal!” He whined scooting away.

“Janus!” Virgil laughed, “Come on, stop being a child!”

“My own best friend!” Janus continued, “Betraying me!”

“Is that what this is?” Virgil muttered chasing after Janus with the aloe, “Trying to take care of you is a betrayal, now?”

Janus hissed again as Virgil made contact and the aloe did its job accelerating the speed at which the scars on his face were healing. It had only been two days since the incident-- two days since they had come face to face on that Pol’turian ship, two days since Janus had nearly killed Patton with a knife, two days since their very close call in the teleporting room and just barely managing to get back to their own ship. But even so the cuts on his face already looked several weeks old. The new scar tissue was pale and light and looked hella cool in Virgil’s opinion.

He just wished that the way that Janus had gotten said scars wasn’t because he had nearly been dismembered and literally sold for parts.

“How will I ever recover?” Janus playfully batted Virgil’s hand away again. “Oh Brutus! My brother! What have I done to incur a wrath like this?” He swung off the medical cot and fell to the floor in an over dramatic heap. He rolled over to stare up at Virgil, languidly draping his arm above his head, and smiled. Virgil who had seen galaxies, had seen suns and stars, had seen distant moons and auroras and nebulas, still thought that he was the prettiest site.

“ _Et tu, Brute?_ ” Janus whispered.

“Oh my _god_ ,” Virgil snorted. “Please stop being a dramatic whiny bitch, will you?”

“Ah, but my dear Virge,” Janus kicked his foot up to tap Virgil’s own swinging feet, “Dramatic whiny bitch is my defining character trait.”

Virgil had a response, he did. But like every other instance where he ended up staring up at Janus for an extended amount of time, all his rational thought evaporated. It was _definitely_ some sort of superpower and Virgil would defend that theory until the end of his days. There was something about his eyes that were so hypnotizing, something about his lips that were mesmerizing, something about the softness of his skin and the twitch of his nose that made the whole world melt away. Virgil could stare at him forever if Janus let him; could drink in the sight of him and live on just the glimpse of his brown curls bouncing to the tune of his voice. 

Even when he was lying on the floor there was a way that he held himself that was so undeniably Janus-like, Virgil couldn’t really explain it. He was smooth as silk, with a tongue sharper than a knife and twice as cutting. With just a word or expression he could change the atmosphere of the entities around himself, befriend a foe, slaughter a friend, raze the world and all its inhabitants. Janus Ekans had always been something that very few people could look away from.

But so very few people had been able to actually _see_ him. In light of empty words and pretty promises and cheshire smiles, Janus had become a master of the English language (and Spanish and Japanese too) and then used those syllables to build the facade around him.

Virgil had taken a sledgehammer to that facade once and no one had forgiven him for it.

“Are you even listening to me?” Janus cried out from the floor, pitifully whiny and offended and all those things that rich white boys were when they weren’t the focus of attention. “Virgil! How can I complain about the state of your betrayal when you aren’t even paying attention to me?! This is an outrage! The disrespect!”

He tossed his other arm up and over his head letting them both sit on the pristine floor and the sliver of his stomach peeked from under his borrowed shirt. (It was Virgil’s shirt, the cleanest one he had and it fit him well all things considered.) Virgil’s eyes were drawn to the pale skin like a moth to a flame, drawn in and frozen in place.

Janus’s laugh died, “...Virgil?”

Virgil placed the open container of aloe on the medical bed and hopped down to the floor, so he was right next to Janus, his fingers hovering lightly over where the shirt had been moved and the pale skin that was marked by a crisscross of healed flesh. It was an old scar, but it wasn’t an _old_ scar.

Because Virgil had seen Janus before, shirtless, like that time they had snuck out of Janus’s Mansion to go for a dip in the pool on a dare from one of them and Janus had tossed his shirt to the side right before doing a subpar cannonball. Or that time that they had gym and been forced to play some bastardized version of kickball and Janus had sweated his team's way to victory and peeled off his shirt halfway back to the locker rooms. Or that time that they had been hiding from the sweltering heat in the library during the summer and Janus had striped in front of about seven different people and made one girl faint.

Virgil had seen Janus shirtless before.

He had not seen that scar before.

So it was new, despite how old it looked.

“Oh,” Janus said chuckling, and lying back down with his eyes closed, “That’s from a Sblorp attack.” 

“A _what._ ” Virgil repeated because there was no way that Janus had said that so casually.

Janus waves a hand up in the air in a flippant dismissive movement. “A Sblorp attack. You know Sblorps? I’m sure you’ve seen them before: Feathers? Fangs? An adoration for fresh flesh? I’m running out of words that start with F, here.”

Virgil carefully pressed up the lip of Janus’s shirt higher, hesitating in case Janus was about to smack his hands away. But all the other boy did was breathe deeply and sigh through his nose, watching him the way that he might have watched saturday cartoons (if Janus had ever had time to watch Saturday cartoons between his extra studying and being stupidly perfect).

The scar was a criss-cross, matching Virgil’s memory of the pointed teeth shape of a Sblorp. The jaw of it had definitely needed to unhinge in order to make the marks, digging in and gripping with the barbed notches. Sblorps were known for consuming flesh raw, for surprise attacks of unhinging their jaws to catch creatures wriggling on the ground, for latching on and never letting go. 

Virgil’s fingers ghosted over the old wounds, touching as featherlight as he could.

There had to have been a lot of blood, a lot of _pain._ And yet somehow Janus was still holding on to that passive smile, as if the memory was more fond than agonizing.

“It was my fault,” Janus said in lieu of explaining, “You know how Sblorps are afraid of anything bigger than them, right? Well Remus neglected to inform me that their fight-or-flight instincts are more like freeze-and-bite. I didn’t even see the thing until it was two inches from tearing out my large intestine.” He chuckled softly in a way that caused Virgil’s hovering fingers to make contact with his skin again.

“Ooh, cold,” Janus hummed, reaching down to catch his hands and weave their fingers together. “It took them forever to get that thing off me. Remus was laughing so hard he started oozing his goo or whatever it is.” 

“Toxin,” Virgil managed, “They… its a poison, that ignites all the pain receptors in the body.”

“Yeah that,” Janus squeezed his palm, then squinted and turned Virgil’s willing palm, “What’s this?”

At first Virgil wasn’t sure what had caught his eye. His hands were slender, but they had always been that way, more for the steady grace of piecing together electronics than for getting into fist fights, despite what the teachers at school always thought. He had calluses from work around the ship and a few scrapes on his knuckles from where he slammed it on the doorway yesterday while talking to Janus. His nails were bitten down to the quick from nineteen plus years of anxiety and three years of a miserable, directionless void when Janus had been dead and gone and past and Virgil was missing the company of his ghost. 

But Janus tilted his hand and revealed the faded red line along the side of his palm that ran from the base of his pinky to the heel of his hand. Janus rubbed his thumb along it, as if Virgil was delicate and breakable and fragile.

It almost made him want to snort: the idea that of the two of them, _Virgil_ was the one that needed to be protected. Like Janus hadn’t been placed on that pedestal for all to see and never to be touched, like Janus hadn’t been the one who had chunks of his face carved into by an alien, like Janus hadn’t been declared dead by everyone back on Earth.

Janus looked at the mark, scarcely a scar and more of a reminder, and tutted softly. “What happened?”

“It was nothing,” Virgil said.

“You are a terrible liar still.”

Virgil blew out a breath, somewhere between annoyed and comforted by the way that he was so easily read by the other human. 

“Come on, I shared about mine,” Janus sat up as he spoke until they were sitting only a hair's breadth away from each other and their hands linked between them.

Virgil stuck his tongue in his cheek and glanced around the rest of the medical bay. It was empty except for the two of them, although it really shouldn’t have been. With the amount of damage Remus had taken he shouldn’t have been up and walking for weeks, but Remus wouldn’t let a simple thing like _his own personal health and wellbeing_ stop him from terrorizing Roman. Virgil wasn’t sure where he had snuck off to, but after two days and dozens of escape attempts, Virgil had just stopped caring. Remus was Roman’s problem now.

Janus leaned forward. “Virrrrrgil!” He sang. “You can tell me _anything!”_

“Oh, can I?” Virgil said, also leaning forward. “Anything at all?”

“Absolutely! I’m a great secret keeper!”

Virgil leaned in, leaned in so close he could feel Janus’s breath on his cheeks, leaned in and squeezed their fingers together. “Hmmm…. Okay, how about this: I am in love with this boy.”

“No way,” Janus faux-gasped. “You’re gay?”

Virgil struggled to keep the smile off his face. “I am in love with this boy and he’s _really_ pretty. Like super pretty.”

“Just pretty?”

“Oh no, He’s pretty and he’s a smartass.”

“You think my ass is smart?”

“Who said it was you? I was talking about Roman.”

Janus squawked, reeling back, like the words were a physical blow to his ego but he was laughing all the way. He tried to separate their hands but Virgil held tight and Janus yanked him forward. Before Virgil knew what had happened, he was lying on top of Janus, his forearm framing Janus’s head, and pressing his stomach to Janus’s chest.

“Hey,” Janus said in that same soft tone had that haunted Virgil’s most cherished memories: the late nights in Janus’s room, the early mornings when Virgil was trying to sneak out before the Mayor's security caught him, the quick greetings in the library before a study session.

“Hey yourself,” Virgil said, his own breaths tickling the wisps of his own hair falling over his eyes. He gently brushed his fingers through Janus’s own hair strands, teasing a lock or two between them. 

“So you really don’t want to tell me?” He asked, “After I shared my silly story?”

“I’d hardly call getting eaten by a Sblorp a silly story, Jan.”

“Perhaps you just lack imagination.”

“Perhaps you’ve spent too much time with Remus.”

Janus paused for a moment, offered a half shrug, and then conceded the point because he was such a good person. He smiled again, a bit of a crooked thing, craning his neck so that they bumped noses.

“What if I said please?” He offered. 

Virgil sighed, although he guessed it was really more of a laugh after all. How had he forgotten how stubborn Janus could be? How he could latch onto a concept (such as how a golden boy and a rebel punk could be friends) and simply _will_ it into being with nothing but his determination?

“You can’t laugh about it,” Virgil said. “I’m serious.”

Janus happily squirmed under Virgil’s body weight, part of a victory dance that made Virgil want to kiss away that smug expression again. Instead he leveled a look down at his face-- a mistake if he had ever made one. His eyes were almost impossible to look away from once he started looking that deep. They were black holes, dilating when he looked at Virgil until they sucked him right in and promised to never let him go. His left eye was gold, like the summer sun rays through the tree branches back on Earth, his right eye was brown, like fresh chocolate chips ready to become ammo in an impromptu food fight, and staring at them both reminded him of the best days of his life. 

“The truth is….” Virgil sighed, “I fell down a flight of stairs.”

Janus laughed anyway, because he’s a liar at heart and for some reason Virgil found that very attractive and liked him anyway.

“Wait, really?” He giggled-- honest to god, _giggled_. Virgil shook his head, but laughter like that was contagious and it had him swallowing back a smile.

“Yes, really,” Virgil pursed his lips, “We were on this little planet, uh, K3-450-something, and I had caught this cold from some Dreyfel that we were ferrying across the sector and Patton had regulated me to the medical bay, but in my _lovely_ sick haze I thought that it was some sort of virtual reality escape video game where the damage didn’t translate over--Oh god please shut up.”

Janus laughed so hard he actually dislodged Virgil from on top of him. “I can’t-- I can’t--!! Oh my god, a _game_?”

Virgil hid his face in his sweatshirt sleeves. “You said you wouldn’t laugh, asshole!”

“I--I’m s-sorry!” He did not sound sorry at all, Virgil noted. He sounded like he was taking immense pleasure in making Virgil’s ears turn brick red with embarrassment. “But I said... no such t-thing. _A game_? Did you have a health bar too?”

“I think you're due for a date with the airlock.”

“S-sorry can’t... hear you!” Janus wheezed. “Over the...sound of-- _fucking video game!”_

Virgil groaned folding his arms over his head and hiding as much of his face as he could. “See this is why I didn't want to tell you!”

Janus’s laugh filled the air, his gasping breaths, making Virgil’s heart do some type of improvised dance routine without his permission. He peeked, because of course Virgil wasn’t going to miss a chance to see the mirth adorning Janus’s face. He peeked and sucked in a breath at the way Janus laughed with his whole body, kicking his feet and curling around his abdomen as he imagined the 99 million ways that sickly Virgil had managed to toss himself down a flight of stairs and gain a scar for his troubles.

“Are you done yet?” Virgil said breathlessly. He had to keep a reputation after all, didn’t he? He didn’t want Roman or Logan glancing by and assuming that he was anything other than a grumpy, nervous disaster human, after all. What would they do if either of them realized Virgil was _soft_ and _weak_ for Janus’s smile?

“No- No!” Janus gasped. He rocked back on his spine and lifted his leg in the air so he could roll up his pant leg, and showed off a series of two slashes on his lower calf. “Okay! You see this?”

He waited for Virgil to drop his sleeves from covering his face, waited until he could see Virgil’s beat red embarrassed face himself, waited with a grin and tried to catch his breath against the threat of giggling forever at Virgil’s stupidity.

“Yes.” Virgil said.

“This,” Janus traced his calf muscle, circling the very clear mark, “This I got from a little old lady on T7-365 who was selling these bad luck charms in a market place, except that she was an undercover police force or something and when she saw that I was a Deathworlder she _leapt the goddamn table--_ I’m not joking! This lady had to be like 400 years old and you know that Shylans rarely live past 200, right? I thought if I defended myself she was gonna shatter!”

Virgil poked his leg, “She did _that_?”

“Yes! Those claws….” He shook his head, quirking his lips upward. “Remus tackled the lady off me. I swear he nearly crushed her entirely. And the _entire_ police force chased us all back to the ship. I thought we were gonna _die._ Almost left behind Bowers and Kyle in the frenzy and-- _”_

Janus stopped. Virgil felt his own stomach hollow out and his breath catch in his throat in an insurmountable lump. The words had left Janus’s mouth so suddenly they had bowled over the others and reality had locked back in place around them.

The medical bay, the cuts on Janus’s face, the death of the rest of his and Remus’s crew.

The friends and family that they had lost and that everyone had done their best to tiptoe around and not bring up. Virgil _knew_ that it had been wrong, to just pretend like none of it had happened to him, but at the same time… he was watching Janus's spark of happiness drain from his body and leave an empty coldness in its place. 

And Virgil had always been a bit of a coward.

If he still had nightmares about the strangers he had been forced to fight in the Welsor fighting rings, of the dust and the pain and the terror, of the bloodlust and the memories that were so obscured by his need to forget that he could not remember the faces of those that he killed….

If Virgil was still haunted by ghosts without names, he couldn’t imagine the horror of being haunted by those that had them. 

Janus curled up slightly, the same way he had done once upon a time when they were strangers who thought they knew each other and Virgil’s parents refused to be proud of him for anything and Janus’s refused to be disappointed in him for everything.

He forced a laugh. “Its stupid, you know?” He said in a way that made Virgil think that it was absolutely not stupid at all in any way shape or form. 

“I keep…” Janus huffed, “I keep thinking...if we had just... God, Virgil there were _so many times…_ if we had just been a few minutes slower and gotten caught by the police, or just hung out longer on any one of the moon bases... maybe they would-- they would--” 

He sucked in a breath and let it back out, long and slow and painful in a way that was beyond physical.

(Compared to Remus, he had very little damage done to him. No lasting bruises, no broken bones, no head injuries. Virgil hadn’t had to ask why; they all knew that Pol’turs like their merchandise to be as undamaged as possible.)

Virgil wanted to say something, wanted to say _anything_ to bring back that smile to his face, wanted to tell him it was okay but even twelve years of school could not have prepared him for this type of bullshitting. It _wasn’t_ okay, and he didn’t need to force Janus to call him on that lie too. 

“It was _bad_ , Virgil.” Janus said, with his eyes closed and voice so soft it could have been drowned out by the silence of space. 

He sucked in a shaky breath, one that caused his entire body to tremble, one that made Virgil want to reach out and hold him tight and make himself a human shield between Janus and the pain of memories.

"I wasn't even close to any of them." Janus admitted, "I mean Remus picked me up off a dwarf planet, and you know being a human and all...no one wanted to get too close." He laughed humorless, "They thought I was gonna rip their throats out in their sleep for a while."

"Deathworlder perks," Virgil whispered. 

Janus snorted, nodding, "Perks, yeah right." He sighed into his hands. 

Virgil watched him, watched him as he ground the heel of his palms into his eyes, watched as those hands trailed upwards and hooked on his bangs, watched as he tugged on his hair the way he used to when they were studying chemistry and Virgil understood it immediately when Janus couldn't figure out the differences between intermolecular and intermolecular forces.

"I should've…" Janus started. "I should've--"

"Hey," Virgil cut in. Because his heart was twisting, because his chest was aching, because his eyes were burning. Because Janus was in front of him and he was doing a song and dance that Virgil had done three years ago when that detective showed up at his house and asked what Virgil had been doing on the fourteenth of the month and if he had anyone to collaborate his alibi.

He reached out and tapped on Janus's hands and slipped his fingers under the palms and wedged open the tight holds.

"Hey," Virgil said, waiting until Janus looked at him, "It wasn't your fault."

"I should have--! Virgil! I should have--!" He floundered, flubbed, scrambled for words in a way he was completely unpracticed in. He yanked at his hands but Virgil was stronger and held him, "I could have...done something!"

"Like what?"

"What?"

Virgil moved so he was directly in front of Janus, so that there was no missing him, so that there was no _mistaking_ him. He squeezed Janus's hands tight and ground and pressed their knees together. "Like. What.” He repeated, “What could you have done, Janus?"

He was shaking, or maybe that was Virgil. Maybe it was both of them. Shaking together, shaking apart, _shaking_.

"I--"

"Tell me what you could have done," Virgil said lowly, "that wouldn't have cost you your life in the process?"

It was a selfish thing to say, but Virgil was a selfish creature. He hadn’t meant to be, hadn’t grown up being taught that way at all. If his parents had caught wind of how selfish and stupid and mean he had become they surely would have both had strokes. 

No, this was a type of selfishness that Virgil had learned and learned and then learned again. It was the selfishness that had reared its ugly head that night that Janus had caught up to him and begged to know how Virgil had known-- _known--_ when the dirty little truth had been Virgil just being an awful person. It was a selfishness that had snuck into his heart when his feet had dangling off the fenced balcony and his lips had tasted like “Blackberry Breezer” and Janus’s had tasted like “Bahama Mama” and Virgil couldn’t decided if he liked the taste of them together or not. It was a selfishness that had torn him to pieces when he couldn’t tear his eyes off the empty desk next to him in Spanish III, when the police would show up at his house four days of the week and follow him around the town whenever he left, when he’d been told that he was not invited to the funeral and he said he refused to go anyway because Janus had not been dead, couldn’t be dead, _he wasn’t dead, damnit!_

It was a selfishness that Virgil hadn’t remembered he had until the moment that he had seen Janus again on that Pol’tur ship, alive and breathing and real--

He squeezed Janus’s hands, held him tight, held him here in this moment.

Because he was selfish enough to want to tear Janus away from the past. Because he was selfish enough to be _grateful._ Because Virgil was a terrible, awful person and he was happy that Remus and Janus’s crew had been torn apart because it had meant that Janus _hadn’t_ been.

It had been two days since everything, since the escape from the mercenary ship since they had recovered Remus and Janus, since Virgil’s entire world had been desperately turned upside down. 

Two days since Virgil had been gifted back a part of himself he thought he had lost forever.

Janus had been an ingrained part of him. The Ying to his Yang, the inverse of himself, the funhouse mirror reflection at the world's crappiest funfair. When he had disappeared, Virgil had spent a year searching, waiting, hoping, _praying._ And it had gotten him _nothing_. 

Virgil had seen first hand how big the universe was, seen the most distant stars, escaped from the galaxy police, visited breathtaking moons-- Virgil had seen how massive Space With a Capital “S” really was.

And Virgil could have been on a distant moon. He could have been in space jail. He could have been back on Earth. He could have been _anywhere_ in that massive amount of Space.

And Roman, Logan, and Patton could have been a few hours slower, a few days slower, they didn’t have to have gone after Remus at all, or Roman and Logan could have gotten Remus and then decided it was too big of a risk to go track down the mysterious last crew member-- 

And Janus could have died.

And he would have been just another nameless corpse.

And Virgil never would have known what had happened to the boy with two different colored eyes who had looked at him like he was something worth remembering. 

Virgil leaned forward and pressed his forehead against Janus’s, rubbing his thumb over Janus’s fingers, mixing their breaths together in a warm series of exhales and inhales and something else Virgil was too afraid to put a name too even after all this time.

“What could you have done?” He asked again, possibly a little desperately, possibly a little harsh, possibly a little mean and selfish and bad, “That wouldn’t have ended with you dead?”

Janus was shaking his head, moving it back and forth. There were words, incoherent and empty and Virgil heard them and felt his chest compress with every syllable. 

“Jan…” He said, dropping his hands to cup Janus’s face. His fingers haunted the marks on the cheek, reading the raised, healing scars like he was an expert in braille, trying to ignore the memory of blood where those cuts were.

“If I had just been faster...” Janus said brokenly. “They wouldn’t have been… I couldn’t...It should have been me, Virgil. I should have been--”

“Listen to me,” Virgil whispered, “Listen to me real well, Janus. Are you listening?”

Virgil brushed back a lock of Janus’s hair, brushed away the strands so he could stare into those nebulas he called eyes, brushed away the falling tears that reminded him of falling stars. It made his chest ache and heave with something distant and awful, made the words on his tongue feel meaningless and worthless. He wanted to understand, wanted to make Janus understand-- How could he not understand?

“I should have--” Janus said.

“No.” Virgil told him, “There’s no should haves or should have nots, okay? It happened, Jan. It happened and it was bad, but you can’t change it. If you keep thinking of things that should have happened, you’ll drive yourself crazy.”

But no that’s not right, Virgil thought even as he said it. Because the should-have-been-theres hadn’t driven him crazy. It had made him doubt himself,yeah, made him talk and beg deities he didn’t believe in, made him hate himself and the world and everything in it, but it never once made him _crazy._

Empty, though. 

Empty was an entirely different story.

Janus had disappeared and Virgil had laid awake at night feeling like someone had removed the lungs right from his chest cavity and sold them to some Quitans on the black market.

And Virgil wouldn’t wish that feeling on Janus’s crappy parents, much less Janus himself.

“I keep thinking…” Janus whispered, “I wish it had been me. Instead of them. Why didn’t they take me first? Aliens don’t adhere to “best for last”! I don’t even adhere to “best for last”! I wish-- I _wish--_!”

Virgil’s throat went dry, _too_ dry. “A very smart man once told me that wishing on stars is a stupid and pointless thing to do,” Virgil breathed softly. “Remember that?”

Janus huffed out a harsh laugh, a sarcastic, angry laugh that told Virgil that he was well aware of that sort of advice and who it had come from. 

“The stars don’t give a fuck about us.” He quoted, parroted, mimicked a version of himself that was four years younger, four years stupider, and four years a memory and nothing more. “I guess... I was right... about one thing, huh?”

The words he was going to say, all of the billions of them, got wedged in his esophagus, leaving barely enough room for him to breathe. He wheezed after Janus’s voice breaking, after the whimpering tone, after the crystal tears. 

How could he explain that Janus was always right? That Virgil would trust Janus over himself every time? 

He hoped that he could convey the message through telepathy or through his touch or _something._ Because if he had to say them out loud he wasn’t sure he’d be able to keep himself from crying too.

Time passed, and Virgil didn’t think either of them really noticed. The lights in the medical bay didn’t change or dim and the door never opened. The halls of the rest of Roman’s ship were a respectful quiet that Virgil knew had nothing to do with either of them as much as Patton was reorganizing the cargo hold and doing an inventory check while Logan went through the communications they had missed and decided what job requests they should adhere to, and Roman and Remus were up on Bridge several floors away probably arguing because they had yet to stop really.

Time passed, and Janus didn’t say anything more, lapsing into that silent crying that he had perfected in the bathroom at their middle school because god forbid someone find out that Janus was fucking _miserable_ being the center of attention every second of his life. Virgil kissed his temple featherlight and softly pressed their foreheads together. He didn’t move, even after his knees started to ache and both his feet started to fall asleep and Janus’s tears soaked through the sleeves of his sweatshirt and left his wrists feeling cold and uncomfortable.

Time passed, and Virgil counted Janus’s breaths the way he used to count the stars, back before he had ever thought about the possibility of actually going into space and the concept of alien life was as debatable as the idea of meeting Mothman one day.

“I…” Janus sniffled. Virgil waited patiently for him to finish, but he must have changed his mind because he just burrowed his head into Virgil’s shoulder, and breathed out shakily.

Janus fell into him like he was a blackhole, and Virgil did his best to hold them both up and keep his heart rate low and even and calming. He restarted his mental count of Janus’s breaths, feeling each inhale and exhale through his fingers that were rubbing circles on Janus’s shoulders.

Somewhere around a sleepy, soundless three thousand, Janus stirred back into himself. He inhaled deeper and pulled back from Virgil’s shoulder wiping away the leftover tear tracks with his pale and clammy hands.

“You said,” He started, with a measure of exhaustion that Virgil _felt_ deep in his soul, “You said...back when you first saw me….Did my parents really declare me dead?”

Their Pride and Joy, they had called Janus once, twice, a billion times. If Virgil closed his eyes he could see them there: Janus’s mother who still looked to be in her late twenties despite nearing fifty now, with long blond hair that curled in perfect rings and so much glittering diamond jewelry that she was hard to look at in in the flash of paparazzi cameras, and Janus’s Dad, the Mayor, who’s dark brown hair and charismatic smile had been plastered across the city every election year. They had shown up to every event that Janus had been in, and had turned it into a showcase about how great and fantastic Janus was. Every award ceremony, every spelling bee, every sports game, Chess club, Robotics, Art shows--

Perfect, flawless Janus Ekans, they called him. Gonna grow up to be the finest President of the entire United States, whether he wanted to or not.

With a life like his, no one had ever really considered the idea that he might have run away. And two weeks without a ransom note had led everyone to assume that he had been murdered. According to the lead detective, kidnapped teenagers rarely made it past the first twenty four hours, no matter how much people loved him. 

Virgil’s expression must have given him away because Janus blinked hard again and furiously scrubbed away a new wave of tears.

“They…” Virgil swallowed hard, “They waited. A whole eight months. But there was no note, no ransom call, nothing. The detective wanted to close the case.”

Virgil didn’t tell him that he had been barred from the service, that Janus’s parents who had always hated the bad influence that was Virgil hadn’t stopped glaring at him, that the media had picked up on the cold exchanges and crafted their own story on what happened. Virgil did not tell him that _everyone_ had eaten up that story, including Janus’s parents, and the rumors had spiraled into a noose strategically wrapped around Virgil’s neck _._

Virgil didn’t tell him anything about the last four months he had spent on Earth, and definitely didn’t tell him that sometimes he woke up in a cold sweat wondering if the Weslor Fighting Rings were really worse than life back on Earth.

“Virgil I…” Janus’s hands reached forward suddenly, twisting around the edges of his hoodie and tightening. “Virgil, I’m dead, right? They _killed_ me.”

And Virgil was ready for the sadness, ready for the harrowing realization that his parents had turned their backs on him, ready for Janus to realize that he had lost something important _again._

Virgil was not ready for the blissed out _relief_ on his face.

“I’m dead,” He whispered again in the silence Virgil left behind. “Virgil, I am dead.” He inhaled sharply. “I don’t ever have to go….” He tugged on Virgil’s jacket again, then let go quickly and smoothed out the fabric over his chest, as if he was afraid of offending Virgil somehow.

(As if Virgil wasn’t fully prepared to give him anything he asked for already.)

“Do you,” Janus asked, “Do you want to go back?”

His tone was entirely too level, too even, too emotionless for a guy who was overflowing with negative emotions. It pricked at a memory Virgil once had of a night far too long ago and buried in a Janus sized coffin: it was the voice he used to use in public when his parents were bragging and Janus was praying that they would stop putting him in the spotlight but knew deep down they would never knock it off.

It was the tone, the voice, the expression he used when he was afraid of the answer, but resigned to the fate of it.

“Do you?” Virgil asked back, because even if he knew the answer he needed to hear him say it. Out loud.

To make it real.

Because if Virgil had read him wrong, if Janus wasn’t drowning in relief, if this wasn’t hope of never needing to go back to Earth-- Virgil would-- He would--

He would ask Logan and Roman and Patton to take them back, if that’s what Janus wanted, if that was what made Janus happy. Virgil would leave all of the cosmos, all the distant planets, all the alien races, all the dying stars to follow him back to Earth. He would forget all about the great, huge, endless expanse of Space and stay with Janus on their tiny, little deathworlder planet in their tiny, little hateful city.

“My parents buried an empty coffin,” Janus said. “I think...that’s the only good thing they ever did for me.”

Virgil’s heart did a pitter-patter in a way he wasn’t sure it was supposed to do.

Janus scooted towards his side with a great amount of effort. Virgil watched him, cataloguing the sudden weakness in his arms, the tiredness of his expression, the fatigue that clung to the very essence of him. All that just to flop his head on Virgil’s shoulder. When he exhaled again, it sounded a lot like him letting go of a billion more unsaid words.

“I want to let Janus Ethan Ekans stay dead,” He admitted.

Virgil tilted his own head so his cheek pressed against Janus’s and breathed in deep. He smelled like the alien flower shampoo that Roman liked to use. Virgil hadn’t hated it, but he also hadn’t adored it all that much. Now though, he thought he might be okay if that was the only thing he smelled for the rest of his life.

“I’ll have to find a new name to go by, I think,” Janus continued, his tone dripping with exhaustion.

“Oh?” Virgil humored him, like he was prone to do.

“Yeah,” Janus smiled a little as his eyes fluttered closed. “I got...a few ideas already. Had them for a while.”

“Do I get a hint?” Virgil asked, settling back so that he could rest against the leg of the cot for support. He shifted a bit to get a good adjustment, and Janus very patiently whined while he did because he was still a brat.

“I was thinkin’,” Janus said, “maybe Janus Storm, instead.”

Virgil’s heart fluttered, like a butterfly’s wings on a billion butterflies that he could feel bumbling around in his chest all at once. For an absurd moment he flashed back to all those times in his Chemistry class where he scribbled “Virgil Ekans” in the margins of his notes enough times for him to be too embarrassed to bring them out after Janus had asked him for help studying. 

Janus Storm. Janus Storm. Janus Storm.

It made his chest feel light, but his stomach feel hollow. He hadn’t called himself Storm in two years, not since the Yurinks picked him off of Earth, not since the whole world had determined that Virgil Storm was a cold blooded killer, not since the detective had asked him to confirm for the record that he was indeed Virgil Storm, seventeen, male, son of--

“Nah,” Virgil said softly. “We should make our own. Something different from either of our families, you know?”

Janus breathed out part of a sleepy laugh, “Like Johnson?”

“Janus and Virgil Johnson?” Virgil tested.

They made twin faces of dislike.

“Smith? Hernadez?” Janus offered. “Miller?”

“Let's make a list,” Virgil suggested tilting his head back and closing his eyes. “I’ve always wanted... to be an Anderson.”

“Ugh, like Kyle Anderson?” Janus muttered. “He used to cheat off my Spanish homework.”

“So did I.”

“Yeah, but you’re cute.”

Virgil snorted. “What ‘bout….Davis?”

“Jones?”

“Janus Jones? You really want to be a JJ? ”

Janus made a noise of recognition, something disagreeable and agreeable at the same time. Virgil hummed in his own chest as he listened to it. The soft huffs of air from Janus’s lips lulled him into a calmness, of quietness, of peacefulness. By the time he realizes that Janus hadn’t responded, his own eyes felt too heavy to bother trying to open again.

Janus and Virgil. Virgil and Janus. 

“We’ll think of something,” Virgil murmured and let himself fall asleep as well.

**Author's Note:**

> Patton: AWWWWWW!! They're so cuteeee!!
> 
> Roman: Shh! You'll wake them!
> 
> Logan: Why are they sleeping on the floor? There are perfectly good beds right there--!!


End file.
